Disclaimer: I don't own Amphibia. I try to get chapters out as I can. Thanks to RewriteTheWorld for beta reading this.
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Wow.
They made it.
They were right on top of a cliff, and they could actually see Newtopia! The city was a beautiful sight, what with it shining in the distance, the light glimmering off of the knee-deep water surrounding it. The only thing that could possibly have marred the view was the weird holes all around.
Anyway. All they had to do was approach.
Everyone piled back in and the group drove the fwagon down as fast as possible and into said water, and the excitement permeated the whole group, filling the air with almost an electrical charge.
They pulled up to the large doors, looming over them dramatically. Marcy was geeking out, her brain running through how epic this was. Anne was in awe, staring up at what little they could see of the city. Even Sasha was excited to finally get off the fwagon.
Felicia and Hop Pop stepped forward, and the former cleared her throat, preparing to request entry, but before she could get a single word out, they were met with a rather rude newt poking his head out the window high, high up.
"You can't come in here. Newtopia's closed."
There was a moment of silence.
"SERIOUSLY?!" everyone yelled in unison, with varying degrees of shock, anger, and disappointment.
"The city is closed to all outsiders," he continued.
"What the heck?!" Sasha shouted, crossing her arms. "Do you know how far we travelled?" She was already mentally preparing the worst stuff she had to throw at this guy, but before she could threw any insults at the newt, Ivy was quick to ask:
Why? And 'till when?"
"Until the barbariants are gone, of course. Good luck out there!" He promptly closed the window on them(well, maybe 'promptly' was the wrong word, he did struggle with it quite a bit), leaving them with no idea of what they were going to do.
"What's a barbariant?" Anne asked.
"They're giant ants," Marcy explained, pulling out a book from her bag. "Their slime is very toxic, and there sense of smell is strong. They always followed their queen." She flipped through a couple pages with an alarmed look on her face. "Yeah, I can see why they'd shut down the city for this . . ." she mumbled.
"Of course it's a giant ant," Sasha huffed. "Why is it alwaaaays something? Can't we visit one place without it turning into something dangerous?!"
"Pssh! They closed the whole city because of a few ants?" Sprig scoffed. "WHOA!" Just as he finished his sentence, a massive ant appeared behind him and headbutted into him, surging forwards. The family readied themselves for a fight, but Maddie, already prepared, threw a potion at the ant's face, covering it with black ink.
Polly and Ivy jumped ahead and bought the rest of them some time by latching onto the barbariant's leg and gnawing on it. Anne and Sasha both grabbed Hop Pop and threw him right at the ant, and the old frog slammed right into it. Sprig let go just in time for the ant to go flying and run away as soon as it got back to its feet.
The family cheered for their victory, but they didn't have long to celebrate, because the ground started shaking all around them. More barbariants appeared, climbing out of their little holes! There were so many of them that they all knew they had no way of fighting them all off.
As the ants approached, it caused them all to back up towards the fwagon, everyone scrambling to come up with some sort of idea. Marcy, who'd been preparing her crossbow she'd gotten from those bandits, fired at one of them, though it still sailed through the air.
"Huh. Guess I still need to work on that," she commented.
She had to duck as Felicia sent a kick flying at a barbariant that had tried to attack the human, and she yelped, getting closer to where all of them had moved to. The frog spun around and did the same.
The barbariants pulled in tighter, circling them, and tensions rose.
Suddenly, all thinking was cut short by something hitting the water in between them and the ants. Whatever it was, it left a black ooze sitting on top of the water where it landed. More of... whatever it was hit the water until there was a circle of black ooze all around them.
Next thing they knew, all the ooze spontaneously caught fire. The water around all of Newtopia protected them from it, but it was enough to scare away all the barbariants. As the fire quickly died down, everyone voiced their confusion at whatever the heck just happened and looked around.
Polly was the one that first noticed the figure standing on top of the Newtopian city walls, though. The figure leapt off the wall, doing a flip before landing in front of them with a vicious, sharp-toothed grin.
"Aw, come on!" Ivy complained.
"How did that not break their legs?" Marcy asked curiously.
"What a poser," Sasha grumbled.
"Now who is this?" Hop Pop asked, inspecting the figure.
At the very least, the newt in question got up rather quickly and laughed raucously.
She was probably the tallest newt any of them had seen (not that most of them had seen many newts). She had a shock of white-blond hair, a long tail trailing behind her, and glowing yellow eyes with thin black pupils. She had a silvery coat of armor with intricate swirls and a cape with the Newtopian flag. Finally, to finish off the look, pinned to her chest was her military insignia, boasting her rank as general.
The newt then introduced herself with a tone that carried mostly boastfulness, but also a fair amount of ego and pride.
"My name is General Yunan, Scourge of the Sand Wars, Defeater of Ragnar the Wretched, and the youngest newt to ever achieve the rank of general in the great Newtopian Army!" she said victoriously, though it seemed directed more towards the humans. They all had blank expressions on their faces, at least until Polly spoke up.
"I like everything about you."
"Oh, uh," Anne took a step forward, proffering her hand. "I'm Anne. It's nice to meet you."
"Y-yeah. Wow. I've never seen anything like you before, but you speak? So you're intelligent, right?"
"Oh... I like to think I am?" Anne laughed at her own joke, hoping it would calm things down, but it had the opposite affect, as the newt got in battle stance.
"Then you're a threat?!" Out of her gloves came blades, kind of like wolverine. Marcy backed up nervously, fumbling with her crossbow, while Anne and Sasha readied themselves.
"Now, let's just all calm down for a moment," Felicia spoke up, getting between them, surprisingly calm.
"Unless you stop pointing those blades-claws-things at us right now, we're not going to." Sasha ready herself to draw her sword as the two sized each other up. After one very intense staring contest, the newt laughed a little.
"Fair enough." The general retracted her claws. It seemed to work a tad, as she looked back at Sasha and took a deep breath. The strange creature appeared to be doing a pretty good job at making it seem like she wasn't scared, which General smiled at. The two stared at each other, before Hop Pop entered the conversation.
"Excuse me, Mrs. Newt," Hop Pop approached nervously, doing significantly worse with that bluff. "But do you think you could get us into the city? We tried the gate, but they won't let us in."
"Unfortunately, those gates will stay closed until the barbariants are defeated. Luckily, I have got a plan!"
"We can help!" Ivy piped up as she turned to her mom, silently asking for permission.
"Not unless I come with you," Felicia shot back. "I'm not about to let you go off fighting without help!" Then she paused. "Any more than I can help it, at least."
"You two can't go off and have fun without me." Sasha chimed in.
"I'll help too!"
"I'll come."
"Count me in!"
"I'll come along as well."
While Hop Pop kinda wanted the kids to stay behind, he figured it'd be better overall if they were with him instead of being left where one of those ants could get to them.
"I'm not a baby-sitter, plus, I work alone," Yunan said, rolling her eyes.
"What were they going to do? Just sit there and wait until you finish?" Sasha was getting annoyed.
"We maybe be kids," Anne spoke up, "but we handled stuff like this all the time back in Wartwood."
The Newt turned away, but instead of leaving, she paused and looked over her shoulder at them, and eventually said, "If you want to come, fine, but I'm not putting myself at risk."
Ultimately the entire family ended up simply following Yunan around the perimeter of the city until they came up to a red tent set onto a raised piece of land with a Newtopian flag jutting out of the top.
Of course, it was Marcy waiting for them to join her, bubbling with excitement. Ultimately the family all piled out of the fwagon and started to follow the newt to the barbariant nest while she explained their go-to strategy.
"Okay, plan is we're gonna sneak behind enemy lines and drive the ant queen away. With her gone, the rest should retreat."
"Oh yeah? And how are we doing that?" Sprig interjected.
"Check it out!" Yunan held up a sash that had a bunch of small, yellow-orange mushrooms attached to it. Polly gasped, immediately making a connection.
"Boom shrooms?!" she asked excitedly.
"Not quite. These are stink shrooms!" Then she paused. "They . . . wouldn't let me bring boom shrooms on this mission."
"Oh. Carry on," she said, significantly less excited.
"They're designed to release pheromones that should drive the queen away instantly. But we will have to fight our way through a bloodthirsty horde of ants."
"My interest has been restored!"
"We'll have to be extra careful, if one thing goes wrong, we might not make it back. Last chance to turn back."
She narrowed her eyes at the group, as if it were a test. Sasha stepped up to the newt and firmly said, "We're not backing down." All the others nodded, and Yunan had to admit that they had spunk.
After some more travel, they arrived at a massive hill with large holes all over it. The newt jumped into the hole without so much as a second thought.
"We should make sure she doesn't get herself killed," Maddie said, gripping a potion in her hand before following suit.
"Look at this! The depth and the sizes of this hole! It's just massive!" Marcy was so busy talking whilst drawing into her journal that she tripped over the mouth of one of the holes and fell inside.
Out of pure reflex, Anne jumped in after her in order to make sure she was okay, and Sasha was quick behind her, though not quite as worried-looking. The rest of the group followed as well. The moment that they all stopped falling/sliding, Marcy immediately stood up like nothing happened and continued.
"Alright, let's go!" the General said confidently.
Having seen Marcy stumble once, Anne wasn't exactly having perfect confidence in Marcy being here.
"Hold up! Stay behind me." Anne grabbed Marcy and gently pushed ahead of her. "I'm bigger and stronger, if anything happens, I can be the first to handle it." Marcy, however, was unamused. "Maybe you should go back and keep Bessie safe?" Anne suggested.
"Anne, I'm not the same clumsy Marcy as before. You know that! Trust me, I can handle MYSEEEEEEELF!" For the second time within the span of only ten minutes, she fell down another hole. Thankfully, Anne was close by enough this time to catch her and pull her back up again. Marcy was embarrassed, but simply thanked Anne and continued on.
Anne was losing confidence and grow worried about her safety by the minute, though neither girl seemed to notice that Sasha was listening to their conversation from further ahead.
"Seriously, we can help Yunan. You'll be much safer behind me."
As if to emphasize her point, Sprig piped up. "I gotta say, I do feel pretty safe back here."
But almost as though he'd jinxed it, a barbariant came running right up to him and grabbed him by the head, and started dragging him away!
"Why me? WHY ALWAYS ME?!" he yelled as he was being dragged off. The rest of his family started trying to go after him, but were blocked off by more barbariants!
"You know, in hindsight, we probably should've expected this," Ivy said, and Maddie nodded silently.
"See!" Yunan growled as if making her point. "This is why I work alone." The newt flipped over and slashed the ants head off like butter. The fight was on! In the end, it mostly boiled down to the frogs hopping on top of the barbariants' heads and grabbing onto their coral-like horns in an attempt to steer them into colliding with each other. Meanwhile Yunan, Anne, and Sasha just weaved around them and punched/slashed at every head that came too close.
"GUYS! THIS WAY!" the newt then threw whatever chemical concoction she had in her hands at the wall behind her, causing it to explode violently! They didn't need any more explanation than that as they followed Yunan through the hole she'd made. Once they were all through, the newt threw a bag down at the ground in front of the hole. Next thing they knew, a whole bunch of purple vines were covering the entrance.
"Insta-vines. Bred 'em myself!" Yunan pointed, looking very proud of herself.
"Uh, guys? A little help here?" came Polly's voice. They all looked at the source to find that she was stuck behind the vines that Yunan had made . . . and worse yet, the barbariants were starting to figure out, too.
"Oopsies," Yunan quietly said with a horrified look. Meanwhile all the rest of the group reacted much more violently.
"NOT THE BABY!" Sasha cut through the vines and was able to actually grab Polly and get her out of there. Yunan threw another pouch of insta-vines in order to push the ants back the way they came. Once they were able to breathe for a moment, Anne turned to Yunan and was about ready to scold her for letting that happen.
"You almost got her killed!"
But the Newt was ready to scold them back.
"Me? First off, you followed me into this cave, I didn't make you come. Secondly, I also saved all of you! This is exactly why I work alone. People get hurt and it puts the mission at risk. Thirdly, who brings a Olm-damn baby into a clearly dangerous area?!" Yunan glared at her, showing her sharp teeth before turning to Polly.
Anne was about to come up with a rebuttal but saw the General's face fussing over the Tadpole. It was like she'd become an entirely different person "I'm so sorry! Are you okay? They didn't nick you or anything, did they?" This response surprised everyone with how surprisingly calm she sounded.
"No, no I'm fine. It was an honest mistake," Polly responded, calming everyone down, so the newt kept leading them through the caverns of the ant hill.
The rest of the walk was relatively uneventful right up until they came across something massive! Like, huge. Giant. Enormous. Tremendous.
"Shh! Get down!" Yunan whispered. "It's the queen!" Looking at it, the thing was an absolute behemoth. A hulking mass of ant. A colossal creature. Mammoth-sized. More synonyms for big. You get the picture.
"Okay, here's the plan. We're going to have to plant these around the room. That way she gets overwhelmed. They're set to go off in five minutes, so move quickly. Also the queen is nearly blind, but hears really well. So be very, very quiet." She handed the stink shrooms to them, and Anne simply followed Marcy in order to prevent her clumsiness from messing anything up.
It wasn't long before something happened. A stalactite breaking off right above her and falling. Marcy looked up in time to see it, but Anne had reacted faster by grabbing her and pulling her out of the way! She immediately hid the two of them behind the fallen spike as the sound attracted the queen's attention. They listened for her to stop gurgling in their direction before Marcy looked at Anne, seeming slightly annoyed.
"Anne! What are you doing?!" she whispered.
"Um, saving you from a giant rock that was about to crush you."
"I appreciate it, but you didn't have to. I saw it and was about to move out of the way myself!"
"No, you weren't. I have to protect you like I always do."
"I get it, but please try to trust me here," Marcy finished. It honestly made Anne feel a little bad for not doing so, but she couldn't help herself! The two didn't notice as queen shot acid towards them. The general pushed them out of the way, however the acid hit her arm, burning her. Like, bad enough that the arm fell off, which was traumatizing enough.
"I told to keep quiet!" she scolded.
Anne opened her mouth to try to defend herself, but was cut off by the sound of Sprig's shout. She looked over to see that an ant larvae had latched onto him and was trying to attack him!
Maddie threw her potion at the ant, causing it drop the frog boy as it screeched raucously.
The ants from surrounding them at the queen's roar, though! The lot of them all bunched up together, with Polly shouting in a bit of panic atop Hop Pop's head.
"Uh, not looking forward to being torn apart right now!" As the ants closed in, the family was trying to fight them off.
"Anyone have any ideas?" Felicia asked.
"We can't keep this up for long," Sasha replied as she slash an ant's head off, a bead of sweat forming on her brow.
The newt stayed silent, but had a smile on her face. No. Smile was the wrong word choice. It was a vicious grin. Felicia was about to ask what was going on, but then she heard a small explosion off in the distance.
It was immediately followed up by more explosions until Anne caught sight of them and realized that it was the stink shrooms going off with little clouds of pale orange dust! The explosion caused the ants to recoil, and within a matter of moments, they were all gone, even the queen.
"Huh, you know what? It actually smells kinda nice," Sprig noted once they all stopped coughing. Yunan, however, kept a hand over her nose and quickly countered his statement.
"Yeah. I mean, it'll liquify your lungs if you breathe too much of it, so..."
"WELP, time to go!" Anne shouted as they all broke into a sprint while the frogs got right to hopping alongside them. Once they were out and in the fresh air, the General immediately threw her hand up into the air and yelled.
"Mission success! And with zero causalities!" She looked so proud of herself! Though that didn't bode well for the outcome of most of her missions.
"Hey! Wait what!?" Everyone else celebrated with her, but something still weighed on Anne's mind. She figured this would be the best time to ask, if any.
"Are you okay?" Before the newt could answer, she gripped her shoulder with the missing limb, let out a blood-cold scream, and everyone's mouths dropped open as a new arm spouted out replacing her missing one.
"Wow!"
"Cool!"
"What the frog?!"
Sasha voiced what everyone was thinking. "How did you do that?"
"Newts can regrow lost limbs," the General replied as if this was basic knowledge.
"That... seems totally unfair." Hop Pop said but the Newt ignored him.
"Alright! Come on, let's enter Newtopia!"
"YEAH!" They all cheered as they walk back over to the big gate leading into the city.
However, it seemed everyone had forgotten just how far they were, and so there was a pretty long walk to get back to the city. Most of the group just chatted about random things, but Marcy and Anne seemed a little bit strained, with Sasha paying attention from a distance.
"Anne?" Marcy finally asked, looking up from her notebook.
"Yeah, Marbles?"
"Why . . . why didn't you trust me back there?" she asked, and her friend was quiet. "Haven't I proved that I've grown? I mean, we were in Wartwood for three months, encountering danger every step of the way, and you weren't so worried then. Why are you worried now?"
It took Anne a moment to answer. "I just . . . we're finally so close to getting answers and a way
Once they were there, Yunan called up to the newt that was manning the gate.
"HEY MATTHEW!" The window near the top opened up and the same newt from before poked his head out.
"I told yo- OH! General Yunan!"
"The barbariants are gone! Open the gate!"
"Y-yes, my lady! Just hold tight, please!" Suddenly they heard some large bells ringing atop the gate and only moments afterwards, the gate opened, and everyone gasped at the sight of Newtopia.
What did you think of the end of Owl House. It was amazing. Despite getting cut they pull of great ending.